Embracing my inner rugby mum

My job interview is tomorrow and I have done precisely NO preparation today. Because I’ve been doing what I should be doing at the weekend. Relaxing and enjoying spending time with my kids. I figure that is far more valuable than working myself up into a state of anger and stress.

We’ve been to see Arthur Christmas at last (amazing!) and the Christmas tree is up. And I’ve discovered I am starting to understand rugby – and to enjoy being a rugby mum!

As I’ve said before, I have given up on under 11s rugby, but I’m really getting the hang of under 8s. It’s tag rugby, so there’s no real contact and scrums and line-outs (whatever they are) are still many years off in the future. So it’s basically a load of boys running up and down a field throwing an odd-shaped ball – backwards rather than forwards I believe – and ripping tags off belts.

It’s only a couple of weeks since I understood it enough to shout my own son. Now I’m learning all the boys’ names and I’m cheering them on too.

Because it’s a small squad, any dad who stands on the touchline for more than about five minutes is roped in to assist with something or other. Today all the dads were occupied, but there was still jobs to be done. So they asked the mums. Between three of us, we had to sort out the substitutions and keep track of the score.

Keep track of the score!? I’m not even sure when someone has scored!

A good blogger always carries a notebook and pen. Other rugby mums, it would appear, don’t. So I found myself keeping track of proceedings rather more than the other two.

There are ten boys on the sqaud and seven boys in a team. There are no judgement calls about who is playing badly or who is playing well. It is simply a case of rotating the boys frequently. So we went for the easiest option of taking three off and putting three on. Approximately every two minutes.

It’s not easy. You shout boys and they don’t hear you. Sometimes they come off when you don’t want them to. Sometimes they go on when you don’t want them to. They keep saying ‘Am I going back on yet?’ when they’ve only been off 10 seconds.

But it’s great. Suddenly these boys who have been strangers to me are talking to me and saying ‘we’. We are all part of the same team. They are checking the score with me. I am the only person there who actually knows what it is. I am really enjoying it.

And to top it all, my son is on fire. I now understand enough about rugby to see that he is playing brilliantly. They won one game 5-4 and the other 5-3. My son scored four tries. And ripped off a lot of tags. And passed a lot. And ran like the wind and got himself into space. Everyone was cheering him and the other parents kept saying how well he was doing. I was so proud and so happy.

If you think it sounds like my kids’ lives are one long quest to get a trophy, you are probably right. Surely he would get the player of the week trophy today? When the coach checked he was going back to the clubhouse afterwards and suggested he thought he should, I thought YESSS!

In the clubhouse the coaches talked to all of the boys and ask who they thought was the best player. My son’s name came up three times. Remarkably, the tries weren’t even mentioned. my favourite comment was ‘because he played amazingly’.

So my boy got the player of the week trophy and we were all buzzing.

Back home he still couldn’t stop smiling. And it wasn’t just the trophy. He gave me a big hug, full of excitement, pride and affection because ‘I like it when Mummy’s in charge’. Hardly in charge, but if that’s what I get for taking a few kids off a pitch and sending them back on again, I am embracing my inner rugby mum for good.